I'm much less at peace with the probable cancellation of ( Battle Creek. )

I think that's just about everything we're watching on TV right now (except The Flash, but I never have much to say about The Flash. Or Elementary, but for the opposite reason). Which means I can move on to the reason I was actually prompted to make this post: ( we went to see Mad Max yesterday evening. Spoilers, obvs. )

And now I should actually do some work! (Oh, and I suppose I should say: outlines for Book Three of ItO now perhaps three-quarters wrangled, and I'm about 5k into Chapter 1. God knows how long it'll be, but I'm working on it.)

I may keep watching just because a) there could be more Charlie/Nora moments and I'd ship that in a hot second, and b) whatever explanation they have for this bullshit anti-electricity field, I WANT TO HEAR IT; but damn, show. One step forward and four steps back.

Major Crimes is like the most amazing vidded kidfic I have ever seen where also some crimes happen, and basically all I need is for Brenda to hear about it and decide to move in to help. Or Sykes. That would work also. Sharon's face in the last episode, oh my god. ♥ That's all I've got.

And the WNBA, omg. I'm still like ten games behind, but I am slowly developing favorite teams - the Sparks, in particular, because: Ogwumike, Parker, Toliver, Beard, Thompson ... is there anyone on that team not to like? I also have a soft spot for the Fever (is it wrong to ship Catchings and Douglas just because Douglas had her arm around Catchings's seat when they were sitting together? I HOPE NOT) and the Mystics. And, of course, the Mercury, who even without Taurasi are pretty amazing. Basically I just love watching women's basketball, and if there's no RPF out there I will be so sad.

Lingering auction fic? DONE AT LAST. Now there is only the terror of the winner not liking it to get through, and then I'll have discharged my responsibilities and will be free to work Katara without feeling guilty. \o/ So many things to finish, so little time before NaNo!

First things first, tiny PSA: I had almost forgotten this was going to happen, but LJ finally migrated my Scrapbook over to the new system. I don't think my image links are broken yet, but I can only assume they will be soon? Which is the perfect incentive to get me to actually migrate everything to Photobucket - and maybe redo some of the formatting on ItO, while I'm at it - but if they do break before I finish that process, I'm sorry!

And The Closer! Nothing really to say except YAY MARY MCDONNELL YAY; I actually need to rewatch the end of last season before I can come up with anything more in-depth.

I've been distracted most recently by my first tentative forays into vidding, which may or may not result in a very basic Borgias vid popping up here fairly soon. Much more importantly, I've now hit 10k on the next chapter of LttE! So it's still going to be really late, but I'm getting there. SO MANY THINGS ON MY LIST. :P

And there was also Burn Notice, which I now find I have no deep thoughts about, but am enjoying even though they're still being a touch heavy-handed about Michael/Fi - not that it isn't warranted in some ways, but I could do with less of the slow-mo table-overturning, I don't need that to remember that Michael loves Fi. :P It is weird but amazing, having ( a casting spoiler )

around, and I'm glad they went for a Jesse episode. Reserving most other judgment until I have a better idea how they're going to handle this prison storyline.

Blew most of the weekend, so next chapter of LttE: 4.5k, not tremendous progress. But still progress!

So, wow, June. You are ... almost gone. D: Also it's going to be like a hundred degrees tomorrow, and that is barely even an exaggeration. BLEH.

There was graduation, finally, and my head did not explode; and then I took vacation and pretty much ignored EVERYTHING, and I went to Boston (and was lost for nearly three hours, but I wasn't driving) and Providence (lost for perhaps twenty minutes, and I was driving) and also a hot air balloon festival, and then I stayed up until six in the morning and almost didn't go to sleep again. (But then I gave in and did.)

I can't even tell anymore! Maybe I just shouldn't be allowed to talk about movies, I clearly have no useful critical faculties.

Books, on the other hand: I cannot turn my brain off. I am maybe a hundred pages into the second Bourne novel (I only just obtained the first), and holy crap that is some -ism bingo material right there. The writing is way too florid for my taste even if Robert Ludlum weren't apparently challenging himself to use the word "Oriental" every two pages and trying not to give any woman a name except Marie, and the way he describes Hong Kong and the residents thereof makes me want to just about weep from rage. I'm sure the movies have their issues, but I'm going to need to marathon them just to get the taste out of my mouth. Yikes.

HAHAHA oops. Man, if I don't post on Monday I'll just let the whole week slip by me, because I'm a winner. (Doesn't help that we are creeping closer and closer to graduation at work. Nothing piles the last-minute work on like graduation.)

But anyway! No Korra this week, but that's okay, because I never said anything about ( last week's. )

It was a bit odd to watch because one of my more recent Netflixen was MirrorMask, which has the same actress in it - clearly she makes all things more awesome than they would otherwise have been.

Work tomorrow, for at least part of the day, because there's some stuff that essentially no one else can get done. And honestly I'm probably not going to return to any kind of frequent postery for another week or two, until graduation is safely behind me and the work level drops off a bit. (So, uh, next chapter of LttE = late. Sorry!)

And speaking of explosions, my latest Netflix was Battle: Los Angeles. I am easy for explosions okay. It was not good but it was also not bad, and there was Michelle Rodriguez shooting things, which was all I really wanted from it anyway. I am super tempted to treat it as something not unlike a prequel to Falling Skies; I would adore a post-movie fusion story about TSgt. Santos in Falling-Skiesverse. (... I may now be the only person in the world who ships Elena Santos/Anne Glass, but I shouldn't be because that would be awesome.)

Aside from that, the major thing on my plate (besides work, obvs.) is auction fic, which I will finish, dammit. I will.

Seriously, without OUaT, there is no structure in my life! D: Still plugging away on auction fic, and on the zombie story; and to give me something productive to switch to when blocked, I am also in the middle of a zillion Alia icons. (Okay, not a zillion, but like a hundred and fifty so far, at least, which is practically a ladiesbigbang project all by itself.) I am almost done with the first season of LFN, and have, somewhat to my surprise, devoured ( Season 1 of The Borgias. Spoilers for S1 and S2; mentions of rape, torture, and violence. )

Given all the awful shit that happens, I can't precisely rec the show, because ... well, I don't precisely enjoy it; I have to do some skipping around to get through most of the episodes without bursting into tears. And of course everything is coated with historical racism and sexism. But! If you are able to bypass or handle the triggery content, it's not a bad way to spend a few hours, particularly if you are into this recent explosion of ~edgy historical drama shows.

I also bought the e-book of Libba Bray's novel A Great and Terrible Beauty, and, uh, the only word in there that expresses how I feel so far is ( terrible. (Spoilers abound.) )

Also, finally and belatedly signed up for Pottermore. Mostly it's filling me with a sort of nostalgic fondness; I care about JKR's character notes insofar as they are historical documents, background on what she had in her head while she wrote. I mean, I'm sure there are people who consider them canon - we're going to end up with a canonicity system like the one they use for the Star Wars Holocron, if we don't have one already - but there's probably plenty of people who are going to ignore them, too. I suspect I will continue to pick and choose as I always have. The big question on my mind is less how much will be revealed re: Doris Crockford's shady past, and more how the hell I ended up in Gryffindor. I wanted Hufflepuff, dammit.

There was also some catching up on Awake that happened, which, I have ( a couple thoughts. )

All this comes with a grain of salt, of course, because I haven't been paying nearly as much attention to this show as to OUaT.

Next chapter of LttE: 9k. There is also auction fic, and I'm still trying to claw my way to the end of that Murphy/Luccio beast - it is so ridiculous, how did I end up with twenty-six thousand words of The Eagle + zombies? I don't even like zombies. /o\

It's flurried snow off-and-on a couple times this week - finally, March is acting like March again! \o/

But anyway. There was a weekend back there, which means there was also ( new OUaT! )

And, um, probably there's been another ep of Awake, but I haven't seen it. First two eps of Fairly Legal: check! How much do I love Kate and Lauren and Leo? SO MUCH, the end. ♥ I also feel like almost the only person on the internet who kind of wants to see John Carter (those books were a staple of my youth okay) and really really doesn't want to see The Hunger Games (I have spoiled myself extensively for those books and the story just does not seem like something I will ever enjoy). ( I guess this might be a little spoilery? )

Maybe when I'm older.

Next chapter of LttE: 8k and counting. I used to laugh to myself at the idea that one day every chapter of this would be at least 15k, but I don't anymore. /o\

Also watched the pilot ep of "Awake". No particular comments; it seemed fine, the actors were all pretty good. I have no idea where they're going with the central plot, and it's not something that really grabs me, but I'm sure my mother will be sticking with it, and by proxy so will I.

Whyyyyyyyy am I so awful at rating things without sex in them? /o\ My violence gauge is so much murkier than my sexytimes gauge, and I hardly ever think to rate by use of swearing - my Avatar Blue People fics are like one-third "fuck" by weight, and yet somehow they feel more G-rated to me than Kuei's mom does. ??? What even am I doing.

Anyway! No OUaT new this week, but I never said anything about last week's, so, in brief: ( OUaT, a week ago. )

In other news, I accidentally DEVOURED the first two seasons of H2O. I meant to make icons for halfamoon, but I haven't even gotten through all my caps of the pilot (and already have dozens, but still!). /o\ Failed again! But my auction stories for seta_suzume and green_wing are coming along all right, so. At least there's that.

GOOD: I came randomly unblocked, and the exceptionally belated chapter of LttE is now over twelve thousand words long! I am caught up on OUaT and Burn Notice! I accidentally wrote a whole bunch of something that will never see the light of day but is still really satisfying!

BAD: I am sick. Said sickness has caused me to miss a professional conference I was supposed to attend with my boss, who is presumably now aware that I am a FAILBOAT, and if I do not get better by Wednesday, I pretty much have to go in anyway, because it is getting far too close to crunch time on a major event for the year and I am one of the people with some serious heavy lifting to do. This weekend has been pretty awful and this week is only going to be awfuler, most likely.

Through a combination of growing disdain for my own fail and the need to track words obsessively for inkingitout, I sat down on Monday and wrote several thousand words. \o/ Apparently word tracking makes me competitive against ... my own laziness? IDEK. But progress occurred, is the point!

The other significant event of 2012 for me is that I hurt myself. It is extremely cold here, and earlier this week the road was covered in ice, so of course I fell down, though thankfully the car that precipitated my loss of balance did not hit me. My knee is turning gorgeous colors, and you never realize how much you use the muscles in your armpit until you strain them and suddenly a million actions hurt. AWESOME START.

Quite a text wall there, but: ALL THE FEELINGS. Honestly, it's a good thing I had the chance to get my thoughts in order the other day, or everything behind that cut would probably just have said AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH.

Lazy day? THE LAZIEST DAY. I did not get up until eleven, that is how much of a slug I am, and I was useless all day. Good start to 2012!

But! Before today is entirely over and I prove to be a total failboat: YULETIDE.

蒸汽 (4568 words) by DamkiannaFandom:Imperial Steamworks Series - James NgRating: General AudiencesWarning: No Archive Warnings ApplyCharacters: Original Female Character of ColourSummary: Qinxian cannot ascend to the throne. Backstory for the Immortal Empress. [Warnings: description of chronic illness and painful body modifications/surgery, mentions of suicide.]

I am not organized enough for a proper recs post, but! I also betaed all three of ambyr's AWESOMETASTIC stories in the Bel Dame Apocrypha section; they are all great and amazing and great, but if you must narrow it down to one and you haven't read any of the source, I would suggest People of the Book.

It has been raining all evening. This is not acceptable, January. I realize this is your first day, but WINTER MORE BETTER.

So, ha, I fail. /o\ I hope everyone, with or without a holiday to celebrate during this part of the year, has an excellent time - and enjoys the VAST BOUNTY OF YULETIDE. :D

The bad: I did not in fact finish that next chapter of LttE by Christmas. The auxiliary good: I do have nearly 7k words of it! I am still working on it! /o\

The bad: I only finished one of the stories I planned for Yuletide. :( The auxiliary good: my recipient seems wonderfully pleased with the one I managed to get finished! (The slight wrinkle in the AO3 makes it BLATANTLY OBVIOUS which story I wrote, if you make even a little effort to figure it out, so if you want to preserve the spirit of author reveals, don't make any effort!) So I have once again failed to ruin Yuletide forever. \o/ I posted the story at like two in the morning on Christmas, and then spent the next three hours staring at the ceiling in my bedroom and accidentally thinking of things I really ought to edit before story reveals. The resultant lack of sleep was actually a really good thing, because at one of the places my father and I went caroling in the morning, I was the only soprano, and I could never in a million years have sung aloud alone if I had been firing on all cylinders. \o?

So where did that two weeks just go? D: Yikes. I am glad it is at least properly cold now; all that remains is for it to snow a little bit more than this incredibly pathetic inch-ish we have right now, and then it'll actually feel like December, instead of November being clingy. And oh, god, the Christmas presents I need to buy. DDDDDDDDDD:

I think that's everything? My most recent Netflix is a Donald Strachey movie, which I have not yet watched but fully expect to like; and of course there is Yuletide. The odds are heavily against me finishing all three of the treats that I've started, but hope springs eternal. As does my verbosity, because at least two of them are over the minimum already. /o\

I have also started The Secret Circle, but considering I've only watched an ep and a bit, I can't really say much about it yet. Except that I had never truly considered a Twilight/Charmed crossover. Also Faye is gorgeous.